


Fuermosi

by melannen



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Academia, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bars and Pubs, Character of Color, Chicago - Freeform, Disability, Fourth Wall, Meta, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-28
Updated: 2010-07-28
Packaged: 2017-10-12 08:49:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/123082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melannen/pseuds/melannen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The problem with a modern-day Holmes AU is that a world without Victorian Holmes would be a very different world than ours. So the only way I can make it work is to have modern!Holmes the victim of cruel parental naming practices. He retreated into the life of the mind and avoided pop culture as much as possible as self-defense against the constant barrage of Conan Doyle references! And when he realized as a result he was only suited to be a consulting detective, he cursed the cruel irony of the world!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fuermosi

**Author's Note:**

> 1) I have no idea why my brain is determined to set modern-day Holmes in Chicago, but it refused to be set anywhere else, despite the fact that everything else I'm writing ATM is in fact in London. At least part of the blame is probably due to previous modern Holmes AUs It's Nice To Know You Work Alone and to As Seen On Urban Dictionary, though this is otherwise quite unlike them both. 2) I am mentally envisioning Holmes in this as looking rather like Aldis Hodge, Watson as looking rather like John Cho, Mary as looking rather like Michaela Conlin, Rani Adler looking vaguely like Indira Varma, and Lestrade looking vaguely like David Marciano, but you could probably come up with a better casting if you put actual thought into it.

The dame sashayed in like she owned the place, all long legs and big dark eyes. I could almost feel the danger radiating off her.

...okay, no, even I can't write that way with a straight face. Though it could be an accurate description; I wouldn't know. I had my eyes closed and head down on the table when she came in, just as the first set was ending. It's a testament to either how much I've improved in the past year, or to how goddamn exhausting med school is, that I can relax enough to do that in a public place now, but I've still got enough alarms set that I came to full attention as soon as she walked in to my space.

"We're going to pretend I wasn't asleep," I told her as she sat down beside me, "I just prefer to listen to music with my eyes closed." And it was worth listening, too: this was one of the best blues clubs in Chicago, and I was there despite med-school exhaustion because my housemate was on stage. Most people these days don't think of violin as a jazz instrument, but any real old-time bluesman will tell you that you haven't heard blues if you haven't heard the fiddle. And if you haven't heard my housemate jam with a jazz band, you ain't heard nothin' yet.

"You must be Doctor Watson," the woman said.

"Not a doctor yet," I smiled at her. "And beautiful women in clubs get to call me John."

She laughed, and held out her hand. "Mary Morstan."

I shook and said "Pleased to meetcha," before the name registered, and then I groaned. "Please tell me you're kidding about the name."

She smiled. "'Fraid not. To be honest I'm not much of a club-goer but when my friend Rani told me that Sherlock Holmes was going to be playing with her band tonight, I just couldn't resist."

"I suppose you want us to find a hidden chest of gold and jewels for you."

"No-o," she said. "Though given the state of my student loans, I wouldn't turn it down. But I think I'd be happier if you could tell me where in Chicago I can find a hidden stash of literary journals from late Qing Dynasty China."

"Do I look like the sort of person who knows about hundred-year-old Chinese literature?" I asked, which was probably unfair, but she was very cute when she blushed.

"Oh! Sorry!" she said. "I didn't -- I mean, I ask everybody that, I'm writing a dissertation on constructions of masculinity and race in early detective fiction, and sources on the _fuermosi_ are just criminally hard to find in the US, so I just keep hoping to strike it lucky."

I feel like at this point I need to point out that I am not the sort of person who catches references to minor characters from 19th century detective novels and discusses _fuermosi_ over drinks. Left to myself, I'm more the Tom Clancy and Stephen King type. In fact, I made it through childhood, four years of college, and two overseas deployments with the National Guard without knowing anything more about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's books than any other English-speaking kid picks up in the street. And then I came to Chicago University for medical school, and made the mistake of taking a friend's advice to post a seeking-housemate listing on the graduate school's website.

It should have been innocuous: "First-year medical student seeks apartment share. Must be quiet, friendly, clean, no stairs, near public transit, male-only preferred. e-mail j.watson@cuni.edu." But when I met dj.holmeboy@hushmail, my first respondent, at a coffee shop near campus, the first thing he said to me was, "You're military."

I levered myself into a chair and rubbed a hand self-consciously over the fuzz I hadn't been inspired to grow out yet. "Former," I said. "They sent me home from Afghanistan after one too many IEDs. That's why I'm stuck with this," I added, tapping my cane against the floor. "Is military going to be a problem?"

"No," he said, and then started laughing. I waited patiently until he had his breath back enough to say, "I'm really not sure my place is what you want, though. I only e-mailed you because of the names."

I raised my eyebrows.

"Hi," he said. "I'm Sherlock Holmes. And yes, my parents do in fact hate me, but other than that I'm fairly normal."

And thus was history, or at least years and years of inescapable jokes from all directions, made. His place probably wasn't right for me - rooming with a part-time house/trance DJ and blues violinist who was still supposedly working on a doctoral dissertation in biochemistry, kept strange hours and was constantly surrounded by odd smells and noises wasn't an intuitive choice for someone still "recovering" from PTSD. But it was cheap, near campus, and handicap-accessible, and hell, the name thing appealed to me, too. 'John Watson' is common enough that, until I met Holmes, people were more likely to ask how a Chinese-American acquired it than bring up detective stories, so by the time I realized just how ubiquitous the jokes were going to get, it was too late: we were best friends.

So I've been forced against my will to become something of an expert on the topic. Mary Morstan stumbling on me in a bar was still a bit much, but let's face it: I'll always be a sucker for a pretty girl. And at least the whole crazy thing meant that I could talk her research with her for awhile without making a fool of myself.

She'd moved on to bohemianism, the aesthetic movement, and queer identities by the time Holmes himself joined our table, slipping his cased violin under his seat. Onstage, Rani had started crooning something by Holly Cole.

"You're Mary Morstan," he told her with no preamble. "I'm warning you right now that if you're planning on mentioning either me or Watson in print, you'd better have full paperwork from from the Human Research Ethics board already signed and sealed."

"I'm going to assume," she replied, "That Rani told you I was planning on coming, and you didn't just deduce all that from my haircut."

"Rani is a beautiful woman. Probably," he added, with a touch of jazz hands.

"Hmm," she said, and then gazed at him over steepled fingers. "You know, there is one question I thought you might be able to answer for me."

He tilted his head in acknowledgement.

" _Is_ Sherlock Holmes queer?"

"My dear Miss Morstan! That is a most impudent question," he said, playing up every trace of the accent he'd inherited from his Oxford-educated Jamaican father, then added, "If you figure it out, do let me know."

"Hah," she said, and gazed at him some more. "Does that mean you don't mind if I ask John out?"

"Watson does not need my permission to do anything. Unless it touches on the terms of our lease," he added. "So you're welcome to date him, but you're forbidden to talk him into moving out."

Mary laughed. "Don't you think that's moving a bit fast, Mr. Holmes?"

"I am not the sort of man to believe in fate and destiny, Miss Morstan," he told her, "But my entire life is nothing if not one large piece of evidence for the inherent perversity of the universe. So somehow I suspect you'll fall in bed with him no matter what I do."

"And you really don't mind?" she asked.

"I'm not making use of him at the moment, so you might as well. And if matters change, monogamy is an outdated and illogical ethic anyway."

"Don't I get a say in any of this?" I finally asked.

"Oh," Holmes added, not looking away from Mary for a second. "And before you get too deep, I should probably warn you that Watson _really_ likes taking orders. So if you're not into that, you should probably look elsewhere before somebody gets hurt."

I buried my face in my hands.

Mary turned to me, very deliberately not responding to Holmes. "John," she said. "Can I buy you a drink?"

"Actually, I would love a diet Coke right now," I told her.

"And I'll have an orange juice," Holmes cut in.

She looked between us. "Neither of you are drinking?"

"Can't," I said, and tapped the cane. "Medication."

"Can't, medication," Holmes echoed me, and then tapped the side of his head.

Mary snorted with laughter. "I seriously cannot believe you two," she said.

"You can get a Scotch, neat, for Detective Vecchio, though," he said, five seconds before the man himself sat down at the table.

"No, she can't," he said. "I'm technically on duty, but you aren't answering your cell phone. And my name is not Vecchio."

"I know," said Holmes, "I turn it off when I have a gig. And if I called you by your actual name, this whole thing would be even less believable than it already is, and Miss Mary Morstan here would walk out on us."

"If you'd just change yours, none of us would have these problems," Detective Lestrade told him.

"But I like mine," Holmes pouted. "I wouldn't be who I am today without it. I assume by the 'on duty' mention that you have a job for me?"

"Unfortunately, yeah," he said. "Fairly simple murder on the surface, but two minutes after the forensics guys got their hands on his laptop they were over their heads, said he could've been in to anything from human trafficking to domestic terrorism for all they can tell. You up for a consulting job next week?"

"Always," Holmes replied.

Over the noise of the club, I could just barely hear Mary murmur "Come, Watson, the game's afoot."


End file.
